1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to transcoding media data files, and more specifically, to transcoding media data files stored on a host computing device for use in a portable computing device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventional portable computing devices such as personal digital assistants (PDAs) or other types of handheld computing devices are designed to operate in conjunction with a host computing device such as a desktop computer or laptop computer. The portable computing device is sometimes used to carry documents originally stored on the host computing device so that the user can access the document using the portable computing device while he is away from the host computing device. For example, a user of the portable computing device may want to transfer a media file, such as a video file (e.g., MPEG file) or an audio file (e.g., mp3 file) stored on the host computing device to the portable computing device, so that user may watch the video or listen to music while the user is away from the host computing device.
An issue that arises when such media files are transferred from the host computing device to the portable computing device is that the device parameters of the portable computing device, such as the display size, depth of color, type of graphics engine, size of memory, audio characteristics, processor speed, and the like, may be different from the device parameters of the host computing device. Simply copying the media files from the host computing device to the portable computing device may not work, because the device parameters of the portable computing device may not be compatible with the characteristics of the original media file formatted for and stored in the host computing device.
Another issue arises when the portable computing device is disconnected from the host computing device in the middle of the transcoding process. Conventional data management software managing the transcoding process simply stops the transcoding process if the portable computing device is disconnected from the host computing device in the middle of the transcoding process. Thus, the conventional transcoding process has to be restarted all over again from the beginning if the portable computing device is reconnected to the host computing device.
Therefore, there is a need for transcoding media files to be compatible with the device parameters of the portable computing device when the media files are transferred from the host computing device to the portable computing device. There is also a need for a transcoding process that obviates restarting the transcoding process all over again from the beginning if the portable computing device is disconnected from the host computing device in the middle of the transcoding process and is then reconnected.